Speech

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My son is turning 3 in a few weeks and after over 1 year in EI with 4 hrs Of ABA per day he is still nonverbal. He makes baba or gi sounds only when prompted. Baba for mama and gi for give me. He gets very frustrated when he can't communicate and screams and pinches and hits us. He might have apraxia since he doesn't use his tongue much to move food around. I was wondering if parents whose kids started speaking late have any advice. He is getting all services but I am wondering how other people's experiences were.

Our son lost all acquired, though minimal speech at 8 months old. He went through EI & preschool as well as school services for speech. He didn't start actually talking until he was almost 7 years old. He had/has babble that you speak of for your child and ultimately it just came. His speech now isn't exactly completely functional and a lot of it is what I'd refer to as toddler speak however he has certainly come a very long way from completely nonverbal with minimal sounds to where he is now. He taught himself to read before he could talk via closed-captioning on tv. I believe that had a profound effect on his ability to be able to use typical speech.

The best advice I can give is be as patient as you can be and work all the time with your child but try not to let yourself become irritated at the lack of spoken words; just because one doesn't speak(verbally)doesn't mean they have nothing to say. PECs(picture exchange communication system)worked beautifully for our son, as did having access to an electronic communication device.

Hi. We started CPSE for my now 6 y/o son 3 years ago when he was your child's age. It's a long and gradual process, and your son is very young still. Just keep sticking with it and try not to worry if you don't see immediate results. Sometimes I would see no progress for months and then a spurt of progress. Also, you may first notice that your son's receptive language improves before he becomes more expressively verbal. My son's receptive language was poor at that age too, it has dramatically improved since then. Hang in there!